Pastor Dan's Perspectives

This weather has made me anxious to play some
golf. It is the challenges that makes golf fun. Yes, I
have hit the ball in the lake at times. I’m reminded
of the scene in “Tin Cup” where Kevin Costner
keeps hitting a golf ball into the lake.
Did you see the shot Phil Mickelson hit in the
Masters recently? He was behind a tree in pine
straw and hit the ball within three feet of the pin.
Wow!

“I believe the patient should send for his
minister when he gets sick just as he sends for
his doctor.” It may surprise you to know that
this sentence was written, not by a minister,
but by a physician who for years was the chief
of the Medical Staff of one of the largest
hospitals in the United States.

Hope you won’t mind the smell of onions in
church. That’s what our olfactory senses perceive
on Super Bowl Sunday when our youth build sub
sandwiches as a fund raiser.

When Andrea was in junior high, I was driving
her home from church before going to the other
church to preach. She let me know I had forgotten
to thank her friend who had played a piano solo
during the worship service. What made it worse
was that the sermon was on giving thanks. The
scripture lesson was about the ten lepers (Luke
17:11-19). Only one of the ten had come back to
thank Jesus for his healing. And this is one of my
favorite scriptures. Trust me, Andrea’s friend got
thanked publicly after that.

There were times early in my ministry when I
would observe faults in a person and decide I
needed to preach toward correction. Invariably,
that person would not show up on that Sunday. On
the other hand, there have been times when I
nearly fought with God because I did not want to
deliver a sermon on a difficult topic. But I went
ahead with it, and someone was there who asked
how I knew exactly what was needed. That sermon
seemed to be directed toward him or her.
It’s amazing how the Holy Spirit can work in this
way!

Just a little over twenty-five years ago, I was
serving as associate pastor at First UMC in Great
Bend. We had handed out Bibles to third graders
on a Sunday in August. There was one family who
had not been in church for a long time, but we had
decided we would present a Bible to their third
grader anyway. And once again they did not show
up. So we asked in staff meeting, what do we do
with the Bible? It was decided I would deliver it to
their home.

The new Dean of Students wasn’t making any
friends. Every student seemed to be complaining
about the new policy; no student could enroll in
more than fifteen hours per semester. The students
had grown accustomed to taking 19, even 20 hours
a semester. The Dean made it clear there would be
no compromise or special circumstances. The
students were flaunching at the bit. “It’s going to
take too long to graduate.”

“We are an Easter people.” Frankly, I had
to wonder about these words when first
observing them on a church’s sign. I was sure
I didn’t want to be the Easter bunny, and
wasn’t real sure about wanting to be an Easter
person.

I should have learned my lesson by now. You
see, in Kansas it’s always risky to talk about the
weather. We have a deadline when the newsletter
is to be ready to go to press. You always receive
this publication one to two weeks after that deadline.
They talk about how the weather is always
changing in Kansas. So by the time you read this
column, it is pretty unlikely that the weather is the
same as when it was written.

STORM STORIES. During the next month, you will be hearing storm stories in our worship services. These will come not only from the pastor, but also from some of our laypersons who have been greatly impacted by storms. The sermon series is entitled, “Where is God When the Storm Hits?” In a similar vein, we will also be talking about why suffering comes our way.